hroughout the past 30 or 40 years most criminologists
T
couldn’t say the word ‘genetics’ without spitting. Today the
most compelling modern theories of crime and violence
weave social and biological themes together.
Terrie E. Moffitt, Behavioral Scientist, Duke University

President
Michele Nealon-Woods,
Psy.D. ’01
President
Washington, D.C. Campus
Orlando Taylor, Ph.D.
Interim President
Chicago Campus
Patricia Breen, Ph.D.
INSIGHT is published twice annually
by the Department of Marketing at
TCS Education System. It is mailed to
alumni, faculty, staff and friends of
The Chicago School of Professional
Psychology.
Address changes and correspondence
should be sent to:
insight@thechicagoschool.edu
Visit INSIGHT online at :
insight-magazine.org

8 Faculty
Faculty debate the causes and challenges of
recidivism: What can psychologists do to stem
the tide of offenders returning to prison?

26 ALUMNI
Meet alumni who live the mission: A priestpsychologist honored as our 2011 Distinguished
Alumnus, a former LAPD officer who reinvented
himself with the help of a forensic psychology
degree, and two graduates dedicated to reuniting
splintered families.

20
29 Last page
Psychology around the world: International experiences
provide Chicago School students with a wealth of
hands-on learning opportunities.

FEATURES
14 The Making and Unmaking of a Criminal
The ongoing nature vs. nurture debate: Is it biology or the
web of past experience that sets an individual on a path of
crime?

20 Teens Who Torment
Although bullies have stalked school corridors for decades,
empirical research is just now beginning to shed light on
the long-term consequences—for victims and for the bullies
themselves.

24 We Have a Hostage Situation
A class teaches forensic psychology students how to
conduct hostage negotiations through a real-world training
experience complete with FBI agents and a SWAT team.

LOOKING to Get Involved?
Alumni can give back to The Chicago School by volunteering their time and talents.
Alumni Relations and Career Services are looking for alumni to mentor current
students as part of the new LINK Alumni Mentoring Program.
• Alumni mentors can be a valuable resource • By sharing insights and connections, mentors
to students as they navigate school, career
can help students learn the importance of
transitions, and/or licensure.
professional growth and networking.

• This program is flexible, fits with your
schedule and does not require a large
time commitment.

For more information, contact Aisha Ghori, Director of Career Services, at aghori@thechicagoschool.edu or Terese Molinaro, Assistant
Director of Alumni Relations, at tmolinaro@thechicagoschool.edu.
Other departments and programs that would benefit from alumni volunteers including Applied Professional Practice, Alumni Referral
Network (ARN), Alumni Relations, Career Services, Community Engagement and Recruitment.

To learn more about these programs and express your interest, visit ego.thechicagoschool.edu/getinvolved.

{president’s letter}
INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 3

Gaining Perspective

T

he changing world we live in today
requires not only new skills, but a new
way of thinking. A struggling economy
and increased global competition are just
some of the factors accelerating the need for a
more innovative, interdisciplinary approach to addressing economic, social, political, and personal
challenges. The innovators who will become our
future leaders will be able to look at an issue from
a variety of perspectives, unencumbered by the
narrow constraints of a single discipline or system.
The collective wisdom of The Chicago School
faculty, staff, administrators, and alumni
reflected in the institution’s new strategic plan
recognizes that a more interdisciplinary
approach will foster important new competencies in our graduates. So it is only fitting that
this issue of Insight focus on the intersection
of psychology with another major discipline: the
law. We see evidence of the interpenetration of
these two disciplines everywhere: in business
settings and employee relations, in clinical
settings, in global conflicts and trauma, and, of
course, in the criminal arena.
Through an exploration of the criminal
mind and the factors that lead to criminality, a

thought-provoking faculty conversation about
recidivism, and an up-close look at our innovative forensic psychology programs, this issue
spotlights just a few of the areas in which our
faculty and students are changing the game—
both gaining and contributing to the critical body
of knowledge and expertise at the intersection of
psychology and law.
As The Chicago School continues to innovate—through creative extracurricular programs
that bring drama and storytelling into the
clinical training mix; to international trips that
incorporate art, history and modern practice; to
interdisciplinary concentrations and degrees—
we hope you too will be inspired to explore your
career, your community, and the world with a
broader lens.
Please keep in touch and bring us back your ideas,
your experiences, and learning. As always, your
insight informs and improves all of ours.

aking center stage at The Chicago School’s 2011
Commencement Ceremony, the Honorable Patrick J.
Kennedy encouraged graduates to take active roles in
“a new civil rights movement” to ensure mental health
care for every American citizen.
Evoking President Kennedy’s inaugural address 50
years ago, Kennedy challenged graduates to serve not
only as psychology practitioners, but as “guardians and
advocates for our country’s attitudes toward mental
illness,” leading the fight against the stigma that he
noted had marginalized many Americans suffering from
traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder,
and other psychological and neurological disorders. He
also stressed the need for incorporating mental health
care into an overall approach to health care.
“Just as we can’t have colored water fountains, we
can’t have a system that is only for mental health,” he
told the 3,000 degree candidates and guests who filled
the Civic Opera House on June 10. “We need a (healthcare) system that has mental health as part of it. History

he Center for African Psychology
opened at the D.C. Campus last year
to educate the campus community and
the general public about mental health
issues on the African continent and the
role that The Chicago School is playing to
address those issues.

gressman from Rhode Island—received
an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters
degree, which recognized his work in
passing the Mental Health Parity Law of
2008. Kennedy is also co-founder of the

It took a step toward realizing that goal
by hosting a lecture in April from Rwandan trauma expert Dr. Vincent Sezibera,
a joint Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence at
The Chicago School’s Chicago Campus
and Harold Washington College, who
delivered the talk, “Psychological
Consequences of Genocide: From Trauma
to Resilience.”
A senior lecturer in the department
of clinical psychology at the National
University of Rwanda, he has studied
post-traumatic stress disorder and child
and adolescent traumatic grief, including
among young survivors of the 1994
genocide in Rwanda.
“I am particularly interested in how
social and economic programs and
networks impact resiliency post-trauma,”
Dr. Sezibera said. “Thankfully, Rwandans
start with a culture and social cognitions
that are based in hope and optimism. Yet

it is the social and economic support that
not only helps the survivors of genocide to
sustain hope, but actually develop internal
resiliency. And that has implications for
trauma survivors across the world.”
The lecture—which Dr. Sezibera
also delivered at The Chicago School’s
Westwood Campus in June—was an
opportunity to get students interested in
the international arena, said D.C. Campus
President Dr. Orlando Taylor. “It’s easy
to focus on things that affect you day to
day, but this talk pushed us to broaden
our horizons beyond D.C. and the United
States.”
It also “opened the doors” to a
conversation about joint academic
degree or certificate programs between
the National University of Rwanda and
The Chicago School. “For long-term
sustainability, Rwanda has to produce its
own work force,” Dr. Taylor said. “It’s not

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 5

is upon us and we must answer the call.
‘Separate but equal’ is unequal.”
Prior to delivering the commencement
address, Kennedy—son of the late Sen.
Edward M. Kennedy and a former Con-

One Mind for Research Campaign, which
has brought together prominent neuroscientists, governmental representatives,
advocacy groups, and the pharmaceutical
industry to improve funding for brain
science research.
More than 500 doctoral, master’s, and
education specialist candidates crossed
the stage for The Chicago Campus’
27th annual Commencement, accepting
diplomas from President Michele
Nealon-Woods, a 2001 graduate herself,
and being hooded by members of their
respective academic departments.
The Rev. Dr. Thomas N. Pelton (Psy.D.
’91) was honored by the Alumni Council
with the 2011 Distinguished Alumnus
Award. Presented by Dr. Susanne
Francis-Thornton (Psy.D. ‘03), Council
chair, the honor recognizes Dr. Pelton’s
work with cancer and AIDS patients in
Chicago’s Hispanic neighborhood of
West Humboldt Park. (See page 26 for an
alumni profile of Dr. Pelton.)

on campus

T he Chicago S chool Here and No w

“The feedback we get on this conference is
from psychologists who say, ‘This is the only
conference I know where my client can go
and receive services and information that is
tailored to a general population.’”
realistic for their students to all come
over here, so we talked about the possibility of their students beginning their
work through a joint degree program,
and their students might come here for a
semester or a year.”
In addition to hosting the lecture,
the center is about to launch a new
partnership with Teach With Africa, a
San Francisco-based organization that
works to alleviate a teacher shortage in
South Africa by sending U.S. teachers to
LEAP Science and Maths Schools. LEAP
Schools focus on providing academic,
social, and emotional support to disadvantaged black youth, and have seen
improvements in the number of graduating students who qualify for university.
Chicago School students will provide
mental health and psychosocial support
services to students through LEAP’s
Life Orientation Program, which helps
students address family issues, emotional concerns, and other issues that
may distract them from school.

10 Years Later,
a Message of Hope

A

People magazine cover that features
actress Catherine Zeta-Jones going
public with her bipolar disorder declaring, “I’m not ashamed” provided the
latest sign of progress in the battle to

reduce the stigma of mental illness.
The cover was referenced at the
10th Annual Community Mental Health
Conference, held June 5 by the Naomi
Ruth Cohen Institute for Mental Health
Education, which was created to reduce
stigma and educate others about mental
illness.
“There’s still a long road ahead of us,
but you only have to look at how society
and the media are accepting mental
illness to see how far we’ve come,” said
Dr. Nancy Curotto, executive director of
the Cohen Institute. “It’s one example of
how our society is accepting that mental
illness is like any other issue.”
Ten years after the Cohen Institute held
its first community mental health conference, “Understanding Manic Depressive
(Bipolar) Illness,” the message at this
milestone event was one of hope.
With a return to the original topic of
bipolar disorder, the conference was titled,
“Bipolar Disorder: Progress and Promise,”
and drew its largest crowd ever—with
more than 300 attendees and 40 vendors.
“The theme throughout all the lectures

was hope, which I think is the message
that is missing from decreasing the impact
of stigma on self-esteem, self-worth, and
self-image at an individual, familial, and
societal level,” Dr. Curotto said.
Past conferences have addressed
topics such as substance abuse, aging,
seniors, and women, and remains one of
the few conferences that not only draws
mental health providers, but specifically
targets individuals who suffer from
mental illness, their families, and the
general public.
“The feedback we get on this conference is from psychologists who say, ‘This
is the only conference I know where my
client can go and receive services and
information that is tailored to a general
population,’” Dr. Curotto said.
The Cohen Institute is already planning
next year’s conference, as well as several
outreach initiatives in the greater Chicago
area with the Latino and AfricanAmerican communities and collaborations
with other departments at The Chicago
School to explore stigma and educate high
school students about mental illness.

Watch the keynote panel presentation

by Dr. Paul E. Keck Jr., Dr. Mark Reinecke, and Nanette Larson

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 7

Dr. Michele Nealon-Woods, president of
The Chicago School (left), listens to the
discussion with Maj. Gen. William Enyart,
adjutant general of the Illinois National
Guard, and Dr. Jill Biden, second lady of
the United States.

At Issue: Deployment’s Impact
on Mental Health

D

r. Jill Biden, second lady of the United States,
visited The Chicago School’s Chicago Campus
June 16, meeting with representatives of the
Illinois National Guard, The Chicago School, and
the community to discuss the emotional and
psychological impact that military deployment
has on armed services personnel and their families. The event was part of the Joining Forces
Initiative, led by First Lady Michelle Obama and
Dr. Biden to mobilize all sectors of society to
give service members and their families the
opportunities and support they have earned.
Dr. Biden participated in a roundtable dialogue
that included high school teachers and community
partners involved in educational outreach, church

pastors, community college representatives,
and private foundations that support veterans’
initiatives. The group discussed services that are
available to service members and veterans in
Illinois, including the Home Again Project that
The Chicago School—in collaboration with the
Institute for Therapy Through the Arts and the
National Guard—developed to provide support
for children whose parents had recently returned
from overseas deployment. Through Home Again,
graduate psychology students worked with expressive arts therapists, using music, art and drama to
help children deal with their anxieties and fears.
The project was developed and overseen by the
late Dr. Ted Rubenstein, a Chicago School alumnus
and member of the Clinical Psychology faculty.

faculty

BE YOND THE CL A S SROOM

Presentations, Publications,
and Praise
Dogs in the Classroom: An Effective Literacy Intervention

L

ong touted as “man’s best friend,”
dogs may be playing an even
more important role in the lives
of academically at-risk inner-city
children in Chicago. Dr. Robert Clark’s
research shows that pet canines may
be improving literacy skills, school
attendance, and behavior for students
aged 7 to 9 in under-performing
schools throughout the city.

The research, which was copresented by Dr. Clark, professor
of school psychology at the Chicago
Campus, and Dr. Corinne Smith, a
school psychology adjunct faculty
member, at the annual conference
of the Midwest Psychological
Association. in May, reported
on work being undertaken by
SitStayRead, a Chicago nonprofit
dedicated to improving literacy in
academically underserved children.
“Animals have been used in
therapeutic situations for years,” Dr.
Clark says. “Traditionally they were
used with traumatized populations,
but SitStayRead introduced them
into classrooms as facilitators for
academic instruction. What we found
is that they definitely have a calming
effect: children behave better, their

attendance improves, and their
reading improves over comparison
groups who don’t have the interaction
with dogs.”
School psychology has taken the
lead in program evaluation for the
project, which is a relatively new
approach to literacy. As executive
secretary of the International School
Psychology Association, which
has its headquarters office at The
Chicago School, Dr. Clark has played
an integral role in that research.
“Many of the children who live in the
inner city don’t have pets of their own;
dogs are a novelty for them,” Dr. Clark
says. “SitStayRead is a very structured
program that requires children to
behave and perform in a certain way.
Often these kids will do for dogs what
they won’t do for us.”

PRESENTATIONS
Dr. Claude Barbre, associate professor,
Clinical Psychology, Chicago, presented
“The Artists Appoints Herself Artist: Otto
Rank and Existential–Humanistic Therapies:
at the national conference of APA’s Society
for Humanistic Psychology in April. He also
presented “The Background of Music of Being: On Listening” at the national conference
of the Philosophy of Education Society in St.
Louis in March 2011.
Dr. Michael A. Barr, associate professor,
Business Psychology, Online, copresented
a paper, “Measuring Outcomes of Orthognathic Surgery From a Multidisciplinary
Perspective,” at the 68th Annual Meeting
of the American Cleft Palate-Craniofacial
Association in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Dr. Robert Clark, professor, School
Psychology, Chicago, gave the keynote

address at the Second International Conference on School Psychology in Vietnam, and
presented a paper, “International Accreditation Standards for School Psychology,” in
Hue, Vietnam.

a Measuring World” at the International Federation for Daseinsanalysis General Assembly
in Athens, Greece, in February 2011.

Dr. Ellis Copeland, dean of academic affairs, Chicago, spoke in April 2011 at Arizona
State University’s TEDx ASU West event on
Redefining Video Games at the New College of
Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Eleazar Cruz Eusebio, assistant professor, School Psychology, Chicago, was
invited to present a paper, “Incidental Effects
of Students Simulation of Tic Behaviors on
Working Memory and Comprehension,” at the
International Learning and the Brain Conference May 6 in Chicago.

Dr. Todd DuBose, associate professor,
Clinical Psychology, Chicago, served as a
moderator for a panel discussion on Medard
Boss and the First Systematic Approach
to Existential Psychotherapy at the fourth
annual Society for Humanistic Psychology
Conference, Division 32, of the American
Psychological Association in Chicago. He
also presented on “Immeasurable Dasein in

Dr. Robert Foltz, assistant professor,
Clinical Psychology, Chicago, presented
on “Adolescent Subjective Experience of
Treatment” at the National Conference
of the American Association of Children’s
Residential Centers in April 2011, in Seattle.
He also presented “The Teen’s Perspective
of the Residential Treatment Experience” at
Reclaiming Youth International, Black Hills

Seminar in June 2011.
Dr. Noelle K. Newhouse, associate
professor, Industrial/Organizational
Psychology, Online, will present on “Development of the Thurstone Mental Alertness
(TMATM) Express” at the annual convention
of the Association for Psychological Science
in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Donald Schultz, associate professor,
Marital and Family Therapy, Los Angeles,
presented on “Successful Aging: Life Transitions and Finding Fulfillment in Your Later
Years” at the Food For Thought Speakers
Program, presented as a community service
by the Santa Monica Co-Opportunity community organization in March 2011.
Dr. Sandra Siegel, associate professor,
and Dr. Linda Robinson, both Counseling,

PRAISE

Dr. Eleazar Cruz Eusebio recently co-authored “Assessment and Intervention
Practices for Children with ADHD and Other Frontal-Striatal Circuit Disorders” in the
first edition of Best Practices in School Neuropsychology.

Dr. Nancy Zarse, associate professor, Forensic Psychology, Chicago received the
Distinguished Faculty: Excellence in Public Service award at graduation, in June 2011.
For the second consecutive year, Dr. Zarse was also named a Carnegie Scholar by the
Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, recognizing her ongoing
work using role play as a teaching technique through the Hostage Negotiation course she
teaches for the Chicago Campus’ Forensic Psychology Department.

Dr. Elaine Fletcher-Janzen, professor, School Psychology, Chicago,
has served as co-editor of the Encyclopedia of Special Education for the past 27
years. She is currently editing and authoring the fourth edition of the work. The
Encyclopedia is used in university libraries in over 27 countries.
Dr, Robert Foltz recently published “Principles in Evidence-Based Standards” in
the Winter 2011 issue of Reclaiming Children and Youth.

Analyzing ‘Psycho’

F

our decades after Alfred Hitchcock’s
1960 thriller “Psycho” began captivating and horrifying audiences, Dr. Jim
Iaccino has put a name to the forensic
psychology classification that he believes
defined Norman Bates, the motherobsessed serial killer at the center of 109
minutes of suspense and blood-letting.
An associate professor of forensic

Chicago, presented a paper, “Understanding the History of Chicago’s West Side
African American Community: Clinical
Implications,” at the Illinois Association of
Multicultural Counseling/Division of Illinois
Counseling Association.
Dr. Richard Sinacola, associate professor, Clinical Psychology, Los Angeles,
presented an “Update on Psychopharmacology: The Latest Medications for Depression,
Anxiety and Psychotic Conditions” at the
California Association of Marital and Family
Therapists 47th Annual Conference in San
Francisco in May 2011.
Dr. Orlando Taylor, president, Washington, D.C., presented a paper, “Utilizing the
Intersection of Race and Gender to Promote
Minority Success in Higher Education:
Preparing Critical Faculty for the Future,”

psychology at the Chicago Campus,
Dr. Iaccino has begun presenting his
findings, most recently at the American
Popular Culture Association Conference
in San Antonio, Texas, in April, where he
spoke on “Applying a Serial Killer Typology to the Psycho Franchise: Norman
Bates as a Visionary Killer on a Mission.”
The title of his presentation offers a
clue into his conclusions—that Bates
actually falls into two serial killer
classifications: the visionary and the
mission-oriented killer. “The visionary
is someone who typically explodes,
leaving a mess—and clues—behind,
while the mission-oriented killer takes
it upon himself to rid the world of
people who possess an undesirable
trait—in Norman’s case these were
people who remind him of his mother,”
Dr. Iaccino says. He explains that the
opportunity for dual diagnosis arises

Dr. Claude Barbre received the Margaret Morgan Lawrence Award from the Harlem
Family Institute in recognition of his contributions to HFI as executive director and his
20 years of clinical services to children and families in Harlem and New York City.

when the entire four-film series is
viewed, showing Bates as a disorganized, impulsive killer in Hitchcock’s
original movie and as a mission-driven
murderer who in later “Psycho” films
continually targets people with
“mother” characteristics.
“Can a person shift from a visionary
to a mission killer? I don’t know why
not,” he says, adding that he thinks
a lot can be learned from viewing
and analyzing films. He notes that
while little research has been done
in the area of analyzing serial killers
portrayed on film, it is an area that
has recently gained traction with the
American Psychological Association
through its Division on Media Psychology. “’Psycho’ remains a classic in
horror films—one that offers a very
good portrayal of the types of killers
out there,” he says.

at the European Access Network 20th
Anniversary Conference for Student Diversity
in Higher Education: Conflicting Realities
in Amsterdam in June 2011.

Bridges in the Academy: Culture-Centered
Pedagogy,” at the biennial International
Conference on The Teaching of Psychology in
Vancouver, Canada.

Dr. Héctor L. Torres, assistant
professor, Counseling, Chicago, has
been invited to present a paper, “An
Educational Model for the Integration
of Culture and Psychology,” at the 38th
Congress for Teaching and Research in
Psychology in Mexico City. He also copresented on “Teaching Latino/a Style:
Addressing Challenges and Strengths of
U.S. Latino/a Graduate Students,” at the
33rd Congress of International Psychology
in Medellin, Colombia.

Dr. Fahmida Zaman assistant professor,
Clinical Counseling, Chicago, will
co-presented two papers at the American
Psychological Assn. in Washington, D.C.
in August: “Mastering the Climb: Minority
Student Mentorship at the Master’s Level,”

and “Lifting As We Climb: Mentoring Diverse
Students Across Educational Levels.” He
will also present a symposium, “Mentoring
Diverse Students Across Educational Levels”
at the APA Conference.
Dr. Nancy Zarse, associate professor,
Forensic Psychology, Chicago, presented
at the FBI’s statewide conference on Campus
Safety and School Violence in April 2011.
Dr Zarse addressed Risk Factors and
Warning Indicators for Violence. Dr Zarse
also presented her project, “Holding the
Classroom Hostage: The Use of a Role Play
as an Experiential Teaching Technique,” at
the international Scholarship of Teaching
and Learning conference in May 2011. Dr.
Zarse co-presented on “Extremist Groups
in Prisons” at the national Mental Health in
Corrections Conference in April 2011.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 9

PUBLICATIONS

faculty

BE YOND THE CL A S SROOM

Q&A
Can We Reduce Recidivism?

literature as actuarial risk assessment. With most categories of sexual
offenders we can run their numbers
and determine right at the front end:
here’s the probability of re-offense
in the next five years, in the next 10
years. The research that’s been done
over the years shows that treatment
absolutely does make a difference. If
you have two people with the same
offense, but one goes to the Department of Corrections and one goes
directly to probation, their recidivism
rate is already lower. They know that
the moment this person gets sent to
the Department of Corrections, their
potential to re-offend goes up. I think
their transition out, the complications

Dr.Z ARSE

D r . D AV i S O N

D r . K E L LY

INSIGHT: A recent report issued by
the Pew Center on the States found
recidivism rates have remained
consistent, around 40 percent,
despite a massive increase in corrections spending. Why aren’t we seeing
improvements in recidivism rates?
DR. BARTH: I think that a lot of our
system is not based on rehabilitation
and education and opportunity for
psychological growth. It’s based a lot
on punishment.
DR. DAVISON: We’ve gotten a whole
lot better at determining at the front
end who we’re working with, and what
risk level there is. We can do different
kinds of assessment procedures,
including what’s referred to in the

in their life, putting their life back
together, employment, housing, financially—they just have extra layers of
difficulties, which certainly are going
to contribute to distress, which probably is going to impact the recidivism
rates for sure.
DR. KELLY: Speaking from a school
perspective, we don’t spend enough
money on prevention and early
intervention, especially for targeting
at-risk children who live in poverty and
have other risk factors. We know there
are some great programs that work.
They’re really expensive, but there
have been lots of cost-benefit analyses
that show that we get our money
back threefold if we put the money in
when they’re little kiddos. We see a
reduction in crime, juvenile arrest, and
things like that.
DR. ZARSE: The research seems
to indicate that we’re spending the
money in the wrong places. Where
we’re spending the money is in
corrections, and we’re spending an
inordinate amount of money there.

Dr.BARTH

R

ecidivism rates have remained steady, despite increases in corrections spending. We
gathered four Chicago School faculty to discuss issues around recidivism, from why it
happens to the role of our criminal justice system to what kinds of treatment work (and
what don’t). From the Chicago Campus, Dr. Kristy Kohler Kelly, assistant professor of school
psychology, and Dr. Nancy Zarse, associate professor of forensic psychology. From the Westwood Campus, Dr. Jill Model Barth, associate professor of psychology, and from the Online/
Blended Program, Dr. Michael Davison, assistant professor of forensic psychology.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 11

“We don’t spend enough money on prevention and early
intervention, especially for targeting at-risk children
who live in poverty and have other risk factors.”
But that’s not necessarily what the research
is showing us would be the most effective
use for our money. What the evidence
would indicate is that if we target our
money in accordance with the Risk-NeedsResponsivity (RNR) principle—which is much
more about rehabilitation—we would see
more of a return for our investments.
INSIGHT: With a criminal justice system
that is more punitive than rehabilitative,
how does this impact recidivism rates?
DR. DAVISON: I think that the correctional
system in the United States could really
learn a lot from the Canadian system. One
thing we know from that is that there are
certain categories of offenders that are very,
very responsive to treatment and interventions. There was some research that was
done in the 80s, and they had a uniform set
of data for everyone coming into the Department of Corrections, which we don’t have
in the United States. There’s an instrument
called the Hare Psychopathy Checklist.
They take people who are high on this scale,
put them to the side, re-run the numbers
relative to a population that’s below a certain
threshold, and you go, wow, you really do
make a difference—we do reduce recidivism,
if we target our treatment services to the
right person. In the Canadian system, if
somebody is very low risk, don’t provide
intervention. If they have a super high
recidivism rate, don’t bother treating them,
because if they’re high on this construct of

psychopathy, not only do our interventions
not seem to make a difference, there’s some
indication that they actually may increase
recidivism rates. So if we put our treatment
dollars towards that middle group, it does
make a difference.
DR. ZARSE: What we are finding is that if you
take the higher-risk inmates and address
criminogenic needs, and then address for
individual differences, that’s where we see
the difference. It feels counterintuitive,
because for instance, early in my career,
they were thinking, let’s put a lot of money
into low-risk, first-time offenders, and they
won’t come back. What the research shows
is the odds are they wouldn’t have come
back anyway. So that was a waste of money.
But if you go for the higher risk individuals,
treat them on the parts that actually relate
to their criminal activity, that’s where we’ll
receive the return.
DR. BARTH: I would also like to add a
comment about the relationship between
criminal recidivism and the high correlation
with psychopathy. The psychopath in analytic
research is defined by the uninhibited
gratification, and criminal, sexual, or
graphic impulses. It’s the inability to learn
from past mistakes. So when we think
about treatment, we have to tap into which
criminals are guided by a strong repetition
compulsion model. We can figure out a way
to break a historical repetition compulsion
by going inside and looking at the gain
of the repetition.

DR. ZARSE: And I would certainly agree, if
you don’t go quite so psychoanalytic, it still
touches on this very popular principle these
days of the RNR. What you’re getting at there
is “What are the needs? What needs does
this crime serve, and how else can we adjust
those needs?” And also the responsivity to
a specific nature. How do we address that
which ties into crime as opposed to some of
the things that we thought: “Well, let’s just
improve their self-esteem.” If you increase
the self-esteem of a psychopath, and that’s
all you’re doing, you’re making for a more
confident criminal. You’re not reducing
crime. So that’s why you want to tie all these
things together to the crime.
DR. BARTH: Well, yes, I think that a cognitive
approach can be very helpful in reducing
recidivism rates, but meanwhile I just picked
up the most recent recidivism rate that was
posted on the BBC in September 2005. In the
United States it’s 60 percent, not 40 percent.
And they talked about a very high percentage
among robbers, burglars, and arsonists. I
think that you’re right, that a multitude of
rehabilitative measures need to be made,
but if we’re targeting the wrong issues, we’re
in trouble.
DR. ZARSE: We know punishment is
most effective when it’s immediate. Well,
punishment in our society is not necessarily
immediate, and in between the crime and
an incarceration you may have had several
other crimes that they didn’t get caught for
that they made money on.
DR. DAVISON: With sexual offenders, the
recidivism rate overall is nowhere near
60 percent. But there may be a specific
individual that you do a risk assessment, and
it’s not a question of if they’ll re-offend, it’s a
matter of when they’ll re-offend. It’s better to

faculty

BE YOND THE CL A S SROOM

“The research is indicating that a much more cognitivebehavioral focus that looks at criminogenic needs,
that looks at the values, that looks at things like
pro-social criminal attitudes are where we’re
seeing the progress and the gains from treatment.”
think about them more individualized.
Last night I wrote up a risk assessment
on a person who is civilly committed
under the Sexually Violent Persons
Commitment Act in the State of
Illinois, and there we have a good
database that we can tap into to look
at the recidivism rates with high-risk
offenders specific to certain variables.
The guy I assessed had male victims,
he had female victims, he had younger
victims, he had a little bit older-child
victims, child victims, he had victims
that were within his family, victims
that were outside of his family. In
addition to the fact that he hasn’t been
in treatment in the last year, he made
it real easy for me to complete this
risk assessment. It’s just as high as
it was a year ago, and he hasn’t done
anything to mitigate any risk factors.
Given the level of psychopathy I’m not
sure that going to treatment would do
a whole lot to reduce his recidivism
rate, given the fact that he’s offended
complete strangers in a public setting,
all the way to family members in a very
private, intimate setting.
INSIGHT: Why do some offenders
re-offend?
DR. DAVISON: If somebody doesn’t
have adequate educational or
employment resources, we do know
that that’s a factor that can increase
recidivism. It makes them more
dependent on the system, it makes
them more overwhelmed, more
vulnerable. If they don’t have the
resources to manage and regulate
those stresses, their risk is going to
continue to be elevated.
DR. BARTH: From a psychoanalytic
treatment perspective, there are three

issues that I’d like to raise. The first is
something that you said earlier, about
regular, healthy longings. These are
people who have dependency longings.
And the idea, perhaps, too, of being
re-incarcerated is an experience
where, even though it’s a bad way to
be taken care of, there’s somebody
at least that is in charge. So the idea
is perhaps based on healthy needs,
but in an unhealthy manner of how
to achieve that. The second is about
the repetition compulsion, when the
person just wants to repeat over and
over again, especially if the outcome
at the beginning is a faulty outcome.
There is a wish to act out the crime
over and over again, with the fantasy
that this time there’s going to be some
good outcome: unlimited wealth, the
idea of getting away with something.
And the third issue is the idea about
identification with the aggressor. In
that, the only way, sometimes, that a
child can identify and feel connected
with early parental values and mores
is to connect to some aspect of their
past and identify with what punishment
was done to them, then they project it
onto others. And this is somebody who
has very limited superego. So coming
up with a treatment plan whereby guilt
is unknown to these people, it’s very
difficult to treat.
DR. KELLY: When we talk about
children that are at risk of recommitting or committing crimes,
we look at things like how early their
first crime was committed—they’re
more at risk if it’s at an earlier age—
if they are using substances, or have
some mental health issues. A crime
that is more severe in nature, they’re
more likely to commit another crime.

But children who go to detention do
far worse than those who do not. So
this concept of peer deviancy training
and when you plunk together students
in a classroom that have behavioral
disorders or emotional disorders,
there is some sort of cumulative effect
when you learn other behaviors from
people that may be struggling with
the same thing. When we talk about a
child perspective, you think about what
are the predictive factors for them recommitting, and how we teach those.
DR. ZARSE: What are the things that
would mitigate the likelihood that they
would commit a crime, and how can
we strengthen those? So certainly
education, we know employment, we
know even strong families and strong
marriages, or strong partnerships, also
are factors that mitigate the
likelihood. Some mental illnesses
are more likely to contribute to the
offending than others, but—is there
treatment, and are they compliant with
that treatment? And then in terms
of specific treatments, the research
has shown that cognitive-behavioral
treatment is the most effective, which
isn’t necessarily what any of us would
prefer—I know that I was much more
inclined to be psychodynamic, but the
research is not supporting that. The
research in re-offending and
recidivism points to cognitive
behavioral treatment.
INSIGHT: Let’s talk about treatment.
You said that you’d prefer a psychodynamic approach?
DR. ZARSE: Psychodynamic is a little
bit more that you’re looking at multiple
facets, but you’re also looking at, you
know, childhood experiences, you’re
looking at more of the interpretation,
and working with that in therapy. But
the research is indicating that a much
more cognitive-behavioral focus that
looks at criminogenic needs, that
looks at the values, that looks at things
like pro-social criminal attitudes are

That warm supportive relationship is found
to be a piece of the treatment. So it’s not
just that it’s cognitive-behavioral and then
we don’t have to worry about what kind of
relationship that is. It’s also shown that
that clinical relationship is important. Once
you’ve identified the treatment program,
still continue to provide the training for the
therapist, including support groups for the
therapist.
DR. BARTH: It’s the transference dynamic
that occurs between the patient or the
inmate or the client—whatever term you
use—and the therapist, which really counts
for a lot of the correction. There’s a lot of
role modeling that goes on and to that, a
lot of repair in terms of early history and
damage. The problem is that oftentimes
the psychodynamic model is not efficient in
that it certainly takes longer and there isn’t
enough staff to have a long-term therapeutic
relationship. If we look though at criminality
that keeps getting repeated, we do have
to take into account the possibility that
the more superficial cognitive-behavioral
approaches may not be enough to get at
some of the underlying, deep, painful issues.
It would be very, very interesting to have a
study which included both short-term and
longer-term treatment and to see if there
was any difference in recidivism rates.
DR. KELLY: We know that the most effective programs for kids are combination
programs—those that target both the child
and the family system, or the child and
multiple systems, because we know that
children, developmentally, don’t take care
of all their needs. We know that we need
to access other components that the child

might need support with, whether it’s the
school system or whatever, but they should
have multi-systems in place.
INSIGHT: What can psychologists do, or do
more of, to affect recidivism rates?
DR. DAVISON: Good data-based-assessments. Knowing what the literature says
about working with this person that’s right in
front of me, and I think the only way we can
design the right interventions is by doing a
really good front-end assessment.
DR. KELLY: I think that finding and identifying interventions that will work for students
are really important, but also using data,
making decisions about students with data,
by screening for a risk factor that identifies
the students that need more support in
school settings, and then disseminating
that information. One of the most helpful
ways to disseminate that information is to
do cost-benefit analyses. Because in this
political climate, and in the climate that we
don’t have a lot of money right now, we need
to figure out where do we put the money,
which prevention programs work well, and in
what settings do they work?
DR. ZARSE: I think psychologists can
educate. I think that we can be part of the
voice that speaks to the value not just of
incarceration but the value of rehabilitation,
the value of treatment, the value of appropriate supervision.
DR. KELLY: I think stigma with mental
health still plays a really big factor in why
a lot of people don’t access support, and
especially at an earlier age where they might
be more useful or preventative.
DR. ZARSE: And along those same lines of
destigmatizing is we tend to globalize, and
we think mental illness in and of itself is a
risk factor, for violence, for re-offending—
and it’s not! So part of it is also educating
as to which parts are the risk factors. And
again, address those with treatment.
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INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 13

where we’re seeing the progress and the
gains from treatment.
DR. KELLY: I come from more of a prevention focus, so a lot of my work has been in
early-childhood prevention and then also
school-based prevention efforts. What we
really look for as far as prevention of those
types of behaviors is any kind of socialemotional learning programs, so something
that’s going to target social competence in
children. We know that children have better
social skills, peer relationships, they can
make healthy decisions, they have good
problem-solving skills, conflict-resolution
skills—those are the types of interventions
that we try to put into place with children
that are most at risk. There are specific risk
factors that we look for, but it’s really about
building social competence before they even
commit a crime. Once delinquency has happened, or there has been some sort of issue
for a child, it is a little bit more protective
than adult populations.
DR. DAVISON: In the online/blended program, we have an applied research project
to emphasize the mindset of knowing what
the literature says, being up to date on that
in your area of expertise, designing your
treatment plans, your interventions, your
programs based on what the literature
suggests, and then also having the courage
to do research as well. So you can not only
develop a program but you can track the
effectiveness of the program. I think that’s
a mindset that’s needed in our culture right
now so we can know where we should put
our money, what works with who, and when,
and how.
I know with the offenders that I work with,
accountability is huge. The Mennonite
Church has implemented these programs
they call Circles of Accountability, COSAS,
and I use that with my sexual offenders. You
need a team of people around you, people
who are not only there to love you and support you but also to hold you accountable,
somebody that’s going to ask you the tough
questions.
DR. ZARSE: The research has shown that
the relationship with the therapist, regardless of the kind of therapy, is still valuable.

“If we look at criminality
that keeps getting repeated,
we have to take into account
the possibility that the more
superficial cognitivebehavioral approaches
may not be enough to get
at some of the underlying,
deep, painful issues.”

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 15

The Making

and Unmaking
of a Criminal

S

ometimes it is easy to deduce what
led someone to commit a crime. Take
the woman who, traumatized by prior
sexual assault, severely reacts to an
unwanted advance and finds herself
charged with attempted murder. Or
the man who was raised in an abusive home and is
later arrested for beating his own children. In other
cases, the reasons are much less clear. Why does a
successful executive, who makes a good paycheck
and leads a happy life, risk it all by committing a
white-collar crime? How does a person from a lawabiding family grow up to shock his neighbors and
loved ones when it is discovered that he is the serial
killer who has been terrorizing his community? Did
something happen earlier in these people’s lives
that we simply don’t know about, or are their brains
hardwired for criminal activity?
The causes of criminal behavior have long
been up for debate, and today there are still more
questions than answers. Are criminals born prone
to a life of aggression and anti-social behavior?
Are they products of their environment? Is it a
combination of both nature and nurture? Research
indicates that genetics is responsible for about 50
percent of criminal behavior and that environment

Psychology’s role
in addressing
the causes and
treatment of
criminal behavior

{By Lindsay Beller}

accounts for the rest. Many experts argue that
inheriting a particular gene doesn’t necessarily
predispose someone to a life of crime—but add in
an abusive or violent childhood or another negative
environmental factor and that risk greatly increases.
What Role Does Environment Play?
Complicating the equation is the notion that while
many of those charged with criminal acts share a
common set of personality and behavioral traits—
such as impulsivity and the need for immediate
gratification—the wide range of offenders and
offenses makes generalization difficult. Ask Dr.
Michael Fogel what causes criminal behavior and
his answer is, “It depends.”
“There is no 100 percent certainty that an
individual who possesses certain characteristics
will engage in a crime. Life gets in the way,” said
Dr. Fogel, associate professor of forensic psychology
at The Chicago School’s Chicago Campus. “When
you understand where the individual came from,
what they were exposed to, and the environment in
which they grew up, you can understand why they
engaged in the behavior that they did.”
Researchers have long studied the idea that the
nurturing an individual does or doesn’t receive

The Making

and Unmaking
of a Criminal

influences behavioral development,
and found environmental factors such
as coercive parenting styles, physical
and sexual abuse, neglect, and family conflict are related to antisocial
behavior. For example, research has
shown that trauma during childhood
can lead to aggressive or even criminal

Many experts argue that
inheriting a particular gene
doesn’t necessarily predispose
someone to a life of crime—
but add in an abusive or
violent childhood or another
negative environmental
factor and that risk greatly
increases.
behavior. Dr. Kendell Coker, assistant
professor of forensic psychology at The
Chicago School, has conducted research
on the relationship between trauma and
delinquent behavior among inner-city
minority youth. In one study that
explored the association between these
two concepts, he found youth who are
exposed to more trauma have poorer
social problem-solving skills, which in
turn is related to higher delinquency.
“Trauma has been shown to have
a large impact on youth, and it can
also lead to criminal behavior, but not
because the kid all of a sudden sees
something bad and they go bad,” Dr.
Coker said. “It’s because they start to
see the world as a hostile place and their
source of protection wasn’t there when
they needed it, so they feel like they need
to protect themselves. A lot of juvenile
misconduct happens in social situations.
Juveniles are more susceptible to peer

pressure and they don’t think about the
consequences of their actions.”
In an effort to understand the extent
to which both environment and genetics
impact antisocial behavior, numerous
twin and adoption studies have looked
at the traits and personalities of identical
and fraternal twins raised in the same
and separate environments (identical
twins share all of their genes while
fraternal twins share 50 percent of them).
Studies also looked at adoptees, and
whether they exhibited similar traits
to their adopted parents. Results have
varied. Some research found evidence
that genetics determined antisocial
behavior while other studies concluded
environmental factors played a stronger
role. Still other research has found
that an interaction between genes and
environment predicts criminal behavior.
British psychologist Francis Galton
initiated the first twin studies in the late
19th century. Considered a pioneer of
behavioral genetics, Galton’s research
led to the exploration of the nature vs.
nurture debate. His interest in heredity was inspired by his cousin Charles
Darwin’s book about evolution, The
Origin of Species, as well as his belief that
intelligence and other “human mental
abilities and personality traits” were
passed down through heredity. His
ideas represented the beginnings of the
eugenics movement, which aimed to
remove “undesirable” people from the
gene pool—a movement that gained
popularity in the United States in the
early 20th century, but ultimately
hindered research into the links between
biology and criminal behavior.
Are Genetics to Blame?
Spurred in part by racist attitudes toward
large waves of immigrants arriving
from Asia and Southern and Eastern
Europe, eugenics researchers believed if
they could control which human genes
were passed on, they could eradicate
conditions and traits including mental
retardation and learning disabilities

(or “feeblemindedness,” as it was called),
physical disabilities, criminality, epilepsy,
and alcoholism, which were considered a
drain on public resources.
At the time, a limited scientific
understanding of heredity was based
on research of dominant and recessive
genes in plants, and the notion that if
animal breeders could select desirable
traits for their livestock, the same idea
could apply to humans. The Eugenics
Record Office was founded to compile
genetic information from families, but
the data was ambiguous and collected
by many individuals who had their own
prejudices about what made someone fit
to reproduce. While no scientific data
confirmed the heritability of most traits,
there was widespread support for the
movement that led to institutionalization policies and forced sterilization laws.
In 1907, Indiana became the first of 30
states to legalize involuntary sterilization.
Although the eugenics movement was
scientifically discredited after revelations
of Nazi experiments on Jews, Gypsies,
homosexuals, and other groups during
World War II, the last state law was
not repealed until 1981. In that time,
estimates of up to 70,000 men and
women underwent forced sterilizations
and thousands were institutionalized
against their will.
Despite the declining credibility of
eugenics, researchers continued efforts
to link biology and criminality, and
some unethical research practices
persisted in the 1960s and 1970s. For
example, the “Supermale” syndrome
posited that men with an XYY
chromosome pattern were thought
to exhibit aggressive and antisocial
behavior. Although subsequent research
invalidated this idea, many newborns,
juvenile delinquents, and prisoners were
screened for the extra chromosome
without consent, leading to further
stigmatization for a condition that
ultimately had no scientific basis.
But since the completion of the
Human Genome Project in 2003,

they committed crimes as adults. To
measure their level of anticipatory fear,
the children wore headphones and
listened to a neutral sound followed
a few seconds later by a harsh noise.
This was repeated several times, so the
children knew that the unpleasant
sound would always follow the first

one. If the child’s “sweat rate” increased
while anticipating the second noise,
this suggested a normally functioning
amygdala. The follow-up study revealed
that many of the children who had not
shown anticipatory fear during that test
had become convicted criminals.
Despite his observation that “bad

Our Brains and the Law
The U.S. legal system—which is based on the belief that people are responsible for their actions—has hardly embraced the idea
that an abnormal brain should excuse criminal behavior. But two decades ago, improvements in brain-imaging technology sparked
the growth of neuroscience, leading to more research on whether the brain predisposes someone to commit a crime. Many criminal
defense lawyers, particularly in death penalty cases, are increasingly trying to use these scans as evidence that their clients had
no control over their actions.
The implications of this nascent research on the legal system are still unfolding, and not without controversy. In most criminal
trials, judges have not allowed brain scans to be admitted, citing unreliable research. But neurological evidence has been used in
pre-trial plea bargaining sessions and during sentencing, and has led to reduced sentences. Proponents of this growing field of
neurolaw, which sits at the intersection between neuroscience and the law, say that such evidence could one day predict future
criminal behavior, and detect lies and bias during legal proceedings, while opponents fear the use of the technology could violate
such civil liberties as privacy. Some noteworthy cases include:
• After John Hinckley Jr. tried to assassinate President Ronald Reagan in 1981, his defense team submitted a CT scan of his brain
that suggested schizophrenia during his trial, and the jury eventually found him not guilty by reason of insanity. Following a
public outcry, several states limited the use of the insanity defense, making it harder for defendants to argue that their mental
state caused their criminal behavior.
• In what’s considered the earliest example of how the emerging field neuroscience could impact American law, retired executive
Herbert Weinstein was charged with strangling his wife and throwing her out the window of their 12th-floor apartment to make it
look like a suicide. During a pre-trial plea bargaining session in 1992, his lawyers argued brain scans showed an abnormal cyst,
causing the violent behavior. Fearing the jury’s reaction to the scans, the prosecution agreed to a guilty plea in exchange for a
reduced charge of manslaughter.
• For the first time brain scans produced by functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI)— which shows the areas of the brain
are or aren’t working properly—were used in the 2009 trial of Brian Dugan, who admitted kidnapping, raping, and murdering a
10-year-old girl more than 25 years after the crime occurred. During the trial, the judge did not allow images of Dugan’s brain to
be presented to the jury, but did allow a forensic psychologist to describe them. The evidence was submitted during the sentencing phase but the jury still convicted Dugan and sentenced him to death.
• After a drunk Bradley Waldroup brutally murdered his wife and her friend in front of his four children, his lawyers argued that he
had no control over his actions because he has a defective MAOA gene, which is linked to violence. Despite an admission of guilt
and graphic evidence showing a bloody crime scene, the genetic evidence helped convince the jury to convict him of voluntary
manslaughter and attempted second-degree murder rather than murder, which carried the death penalty. He was sentenced to
32 years in prison.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 17

which identified thousands of new
genes, there has been a renewed, yet
cautious, interest in the link between
biology and criminal behavior, and the
research has only recently begun to gain
a fragile credibility. Certain genes, like
one that regulates the production of
the MAOA enzyme, for example, have
been linked to aggressive and impulsive
behavior. But while about 100 studies
have shown a link between genes and
crime, many researchers reject the
theory of biological determinism—that
our genes determine our personalities
and who we become—and say that
environment plays an important role
in whether and how a gene is expressed.
The brain has become the latest frontier
in the quest to understand criminal
behavior, particularly of psychopaths
and violent offenders. In the growing
field of neurocriminology, which is the
application of neuroscience to criminology, researchers have documented
differences between the criminal brain
and the “normal” brain.
Dr. Adrian Raine, a psychologist
at University of Pennsylvania, has
conducted studies that show a correlation
between criminal behavior and the amygdala—“the guardian angel of behavior”
as he described it to an audience at the
University of Missouri. The amygdala
is located in the prefrontal cortex and is
associated with emotion and fear—the
idea being the less fear someone has, the
less likely he is to have a conscience guide
his behavior. In one study, he found
an 18 percent volume reduction in the
amygdala of psychopaths compared to
non-psychopaths.
Dr. Raine was also part of a
longitudinal study that examined
the fear-conditioning response of
3-year-olds in the island nation of
Mauritius. Based on the theory that a
dysfunctional amygdala leads to poor
fear conditioning and increases the risk
of criminal behavior, his team examined children early in life and, 20 years
later, gathered information on whether

The Making

and Unmaking
of a Criminal

Changing the Way We Think
Dr. Samenow identified numerous thinking errors that can lead to negative or antisocial behavior. Cognitive behavioral
therapy can help an offender change the way he thinks and thus make positive changes in behavior. Some examples of
thinking errors or distorted thinking include:
• Immature or developmentally arrested thoughts.
• Poor problem solving and decision making.
• An inability to consider the effects of one’s behavior.
• An egocentric viewpoint with a negative view or lack of trust in other people.
• A hampered ability to reason and accept blame for wrongdoing.
• A mistaken belief of entitlement, including an inability to delay gratification, confusing wants and needs, and ignoring the
rights of other people.
• A tendency to act on impulse, including a lack of self-control and empathy.
• An inability to manage feelings of anger.
• The use of force and violence as a means to achieve goals.
Sources: NIJ Journal, Issue No. 265; The Criminal Personality, Volume 1: A Profile for Change by S. Yochelson, and S.E. Samenow; The
Criminal Lifestyle: Patterns of Serious Criminal Conduct by G. Walters

brains lead to bad behavior,” Dr. Raine
shares the belief with many other
researchers that one’s environment can
still impact whether someone becomes
a criminal. “It’s not biology versus
environment. It’s biology plus environment,” he told The Times of London in a
2010 interview.
At least one psychologist rejects the
notions that biology or environment
leads to criminal behavior. In his book,
Inside the Criminal Mind, Dr. Stanton E.
Samenow argued that regardless of their
background, criminals think differently
than non-criminals—that they make a
choice to commit a crime, and should be
held fully responsible for their actions.
Blaming one’s environment or even a
mental illness paints the offender as a
victim, he writes, and research on genetic
links to criminality has been inconclusive.
Instead criminal patterns such as lying
and breaking rules begin during early
childhood and culminate into a life of
crime. “The person who makes crime
a way of life has a radically different
way of thinking from the individual
who behaves responsibly,” he wrote in

the book. “The two mentalities are so
different, it’s as though the criminals
were a different breed.”
Based on this theory, Dr. Samenow—
who collaborated with and built on
work started by his mentor, Dr. Samuel
Yochelson, in the 1960s—proposed that
the only way to rehabilitate a criminal
was for him to change the way he thinks,
which would lead to better behavior. In
their 1977 book The Criminal Personality,
the authors identified 52 “thinking
errors,” such as poor decision making,
failure to consider injury to others, and
lack of trust. The notion that criminals
demonstrate errors in their thinking has
become a critical element in cognitive
behavior therapy (CBT), which is
considered the most effective treatment
to keep offenders from committing
further crimes.
What Treatments Work?
Advances in treating offenders have come
a long way since 1974 when sociologist
Robert Martinson reviewed 231 studies
that evaluated the impact of rehabilitation programs and found they had little

impact on recidivism. The media seized
on the message that “nothing works,”
repudiating the criminal justice system’s
focus on the rehabilitation of criminals.
The findings, splashed on magazine covers and in newspaper articles, contributed
to the rise to the “get tough on crime”
approach in the United States.
But in the decades that followed, even
as the criminal justice system became
more punitive, cognitive behavioral
therapy emerged as the treatment with
the greatest impact in reducing the
recurrence of criminal behavior in juveniles and adults, and in decreasing the
incidence of depression and substance
abuse. One 2005 study found that CBT
reduced recidivism by an average of 25
percent, with some programs finding
reductions of more than 50 percent.
Even high-risk offenders were responsive
to the treatment.
CBT—a blend of cognitive theory and
its focus on internal thought processes
with behavioral theory and its emphasis
on external behaviors—teaches offenders
to identify distortions in their thinking
and understand that altering the way

has failed to have significant impact on
changing the thinking, attitudes, and
behaviors of offenders.”
As CBT became the widely accepted
treatment for offenders, an evolution in
risk assessments has resulted in more
accurate evaluations and treatment plans.
At first professional judgment was used to
predict criminal behavior until the 1970s,
when psychologists recognized that risk
assessments needed to more evidence
behind them. They began to consider
such factors as the history of criminality, substance abuse, past employment,
violent behavior, social networks, and age,
which improved accuracy and credibility. Assessments further evolved to
consider factors like the offender’s current
situation resulting in more targeted
interventions. In the last few years, a
supervision component has helped ensure
that offenders are compliant with their
treatment, which reduces their risk of
further criminal behavior.
As risk assessments improved,
psychologists D.A. Andrews and
James Bonta developed the riskneed-responsivity (RNR) model of
offender rehabilitation. First used in
Canada, the model is considered the
most effective way to assess and treat
criminals, especially higher-risk offenders
who traditionally weren’t as likely to
receive rehabilitation services as low-risk
offenders. The RNR model is based on
three principles that guide interventions:
the offender’s level of risk, the services
that address criminogenic needs, and the
types of treatment programs to provide.
Providing interventions that target
the offender’s criminogenic needs is
considered critical to overall success. As
opposed to static risk factors linked to
criminal behavior, such as one’s history
of violence, criminogenic needs are
dynamic risk factors that can be altered
to bring about more positive outcomes.
For example, if all of an offender’s friends
are criminals, a treatment program
would encourage him to avoid bad

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 19

they think will lead to positive changes
in behavior. Offenders might be taught
coping or problem-solving skills. Dr.
Nancy Zarse, associate professor of
forensic psychology at The Chicago
School, explained how the treatment
worked for an inmate she treated during
a 16-week cognitive behavioral therapy
program. When asked to describe the
crime that he had committed—from
start to finish—the offender told of a
midnight visit from an acquaintance
inviting him to help steal $800 tires from
a car that had broken down.
“We walked through, from that moment on, how many thinking errors he
had and how many rationalizations there
were between him leaving that house and
getting to the actual car,” she said. “Part
of what I wanted to help him see was at
how many different points he could have
made a different choice and not gone
to the crime scene. Because once you’re
there, what’s the likelihood that you’re
going to turn away?”
When the program concluded, the
inmate told her that the exercise was
the most valuable part of his treatment.
“For him, that’s when he realized, wow,
that’s what I’ve been doing,” Dr. Zarse
said. “Part of what you want to teach in
cognitive behavioral treatment is those
earlier decisions, those earlier thinking
errors and cognitive distortions, that have
a pro-criminal influence as opposed to a
pro-social influence.”
Other treatments such as behavioral therapy and psychotherapy show
little evidence of being as effective as
cognitive behavioral therapy in treating
criminals. One study that found that
CBT programs were 30 percent more
effective than behavioral ones, while a
2007 report from the National Institute
of Corrections stated, “Traditional
psychotherapy is egocentric; it helps
individuals solve their personal problems,
feel better about themselves, and fulfill
their inner goals and expectations. This
egocentric psychotherapy, in and of itself,

Cognitive behavioral therapy
emerged as the treatment
with the greatest impact
in reducing the recurrence
of criminal behavior in
juveniles and adults.
influences. Or if the offender has too
much time on his hands—time that typically gets him into trouble—a treatment
program might introduce a new activity
and support participation.
Although research is producing
evidence-based treatments that have
a positive impact on recidivism, such
advances alone often aren’t enough
to magically turn prior offenders into
law-abiding citizens. Such programs
cost money to implement, and lack of
funding is an ever-present impediment.
In 2009, there were more than 1.6
million incarcerated in state or federal
prisons, according to the Bureau of
Justice Statistics, but the recession has
led to budget cuts in rehabilitation
programs. Last year, California cut 36
percent in funding for such initiatives,
and numerous other states have made
or are considering cuts, including Texas,
Kansas, Indiana, and Pennsylvania.
“Psychological factors play significant
roles in criminal behavior, but it takes
time to treat them, and oftentimes there
aren’t resources to do so,” Dr. Fogel
said. “How much rehabilitation can
occur when there isn’t money provided
for programs?”

Teens Who Torment
Behind the bullying epidemic in
schools and on the web

{By Judy Beaupre}

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 21

KIDS WILL BE KIDS.
We’ve been saying it for years, sometimes as an explanation
for actions that defy adult understanding, occasionally to
dismiss or downplay the need for personal accountability,
and—perhaps way too often—to convince ourselves that
the sometimes-alarming behavior we witness in the young
people around us is “normal.”

ake bullying. Once seen as a “rite of passage,”
bullying was a label for such innocuous
behavior as taping a “call me stupid” sign
to the new kid’s back, hiding earthworms
in a classmate’s lunchbox, or—as depicted
repeatedly in the musical comedy series,
Glee—tossing a slushie in someone’s face.
Messy, uncomfortable, embarrassing—but
not all that damaging in the long run.
That has changed, or at least our recognition of the sometimes-dire consequences
that can accompany bullying has. Today’s
version of peer-to-peer torment has captured
media attention as a far more disturbing
trend—one that transcends hurt feelings
and strawberry-stained clothing, instead
being blamed for suicides, catastrophic acts
of mass revenge, and long-term mental
health consequences for victims, perpetrators, witnesses, and family members.
“Between 15 and 30 percent of students
in today’s schools are involved with regularity
in bullying—and often with negative consequences,” says Dr. Dan Olweus, a professor
of psychology at the University of Bergen
in Norway, who has devoted more than 40
years to bullying research and is recognized
as an international authority on the subject.
“Victims suffer from anxiety, depression,
poor self-esteem—they view the rejection by
their peer group as too hard to handle.”
Others put the prevalence of bullying
far higher than Olweus’ estimate. Research
published in 2009 in the Journal of Adolescent
Health reported that, while only 20 percent
of students reported involvement in physical

bullying—either as a victim or a bully—more
than half were involved in social bullying
(defined as social exclusion or spreading
rumors) and even more—54 percent—were
on the giving or receiving end of verbal bullying. The most recent addition to the bully’s
arsenal—cyberbullying—is the fastest growing, accounting for an ever-increasing portion
of teen harassment cases. This 21st-century
twist on the age-old practice of picking on
classmates encompasses the rampant use of
the Internet, email, and texting to demean or
harass others. Cyberbullying is, in some ways,
the most dangerous; it extends the bully’s
timeframe for making a peer’s life miserable
from school hours to 24/7, and vastly expands
the reach of ugly rumors, innuendo, and
compromising or humiliating photos.
While bullying has been around for
decades—if not centuries—social scientists
have only recently gathered enough
empirical data to draw conclusions about
the phenomenon’s long-term psychological
effects. According to researchers, students
who have been repeatedly intimidated
or persecuted are far more likely to be
emotionally distressed and twice as likely
as their non-involved peers to experience
psychosomatic symptoms such as headaches
and abdominal pain. Most alarming of all
is the connection that has been suggested
between bullying and suicidal ideation.
During the past year alone, news media
have been peppered with the stories of
children and teens who became victims of
what is sometimes referred to as bullycide.

Teens Who Torment

Bullying by the Numbers

2 9
to

x

Bullying victims are 2 to 9 times more
likely to consider suicide than nonvictims.

160,000

students stay home from school every
day to avoid bullying.

5x

Students who describe themselves as
lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender
are 5 times more likely to miss school
because of feeling unsafe.

60 %

of American teens witness bullying at
least once a day.

25%

of students victimized by bullying
report that they are targeted because
of their race or religion.

75%

of school shooting incidents are linked to
harassment and bullying.
Yale University School of Medicine Child Study Center, National
Crime Prevention Council, U.S. Department of Justice, U.S.
Secret Service, National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

In Massachusetts, a 15-year-old high school girl
whose family had recently moved to the United
States from Ireland was taunted with cultural
slurs—and physically harassed as she walked
home from school—until she hanged herself in
the stairwell of her home. In Minnesota, two
eighth-grade girls fulfilled a suicide pact after
repeatedly indicating that they were ostracized
and bullied by classmates. And in New Jersey, an
18-year-old Rutgers University student jumped
to his death from the George Washington Bridge
after classmates secretly shot video of him in an
intimate encounter with another male student and
streamed it online.
While the reasons students are targeted for
harassment are many, “being different” leads the
list. Few groups are singled out more frequently
than students who are—or who are perceived to
be—gay. One study produced in 2010 by Iowa
State University researchers showed that more
than half of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender
(LGBT) youth had been cyberbullied in the 30
days preceding the survey. For many, this led to
depression and—for 26 percent—thoughts of
suicide.
“There’s a saying that we’ve now changed to
read, ‘Sticks and stones can break my bones, but
words can kill,’” Warren Blumenfeld, an assistant
professor who co-authored the study, told the
ScienceDaily website. “Pre-adolescence through
adolescence is a time when peer influences are
paramount in a young person’s life. If one is
ostracized and attacked, that can have devastating

Bystanders...
Bullying victims—those on the receiving end of their tormenters’ intentional, often-vicious mistreatment—aren’t the only ones left with psychological baggage.
Research published in 2009 in School Psychology Quarterly suggested that students who watch their
friends endure intimidation and humiliation at the hands—or keyboards—of school bullies may become
as psychologically distressed—and sometimes more so—than the victims themselves. They may be
more likely to take drugs and drink alcohol and face mental health risks even greater than those for
students who were bullying victims.
The reasons, researchers say, may include the fact that the witness has been bullied previoiusly
and may be experiencing revictimization—or may fear receiving the same treatment in the future.
Alternatively, the bystander may feel guilty that he did not intervene and come to the aid of the peer
being bullied.
"Witnessing bullying is in itself a social experience in which children directly learn fundamental
lessons about power, authority, empathy, injustice, social responsibility, and courage or the lack
of it," psychologist Linda Jeffrey reported in a recent issue of The Prevention Researcher. She cited

consequences—not only physically, but on their
emotional health for the rest of their life.”
Recent research published this year in the
Journal of School Health supports Blumenfeld’s
contention. According to the study, LGBT young
adults who had been victimized during adolescence
were more than five times as likely to report having
attempted suicide and more than twice as likely to
report clinical levels of depression.
“We now have evidence of the lasting personal
and social cost of failing to make our schools safe
for all students,” said University of Arizona professor Stephen Russell, the study’s lead author. “In
our study, we see the effects of school victimization
up to a decade later or more.”
Tackling the Problem
Teen angst is nothing new, and has long provided
a steady stream of clients for mental health professionals who work with this population—child and
adolescent psychologists, clinical counselors, school
psychologists, and marital and family therapists.
The growing recognition of bullying’s long-term
impact, however, has caused professionals to take
a closer look at causes and consequences, and to
develop more proactive approaches to curbing
the practice’s most egregious forms and teaching
victims resilience strategies.
Dr. Olweus, the international bullying authority
quoted earlier in this story, used his four decades of
research to develop the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program, which has been implemented in
elementary, middle, and junior high schools across

research showing that while 85 percent of bullying episodes take place with peers present, bystanders
intervene in only 10 percent of cases.
... and Bullies
Bullies themselves demonstrate characteristics that lead to—and result from—habitual mistreatment
of others. Dr. Dan Olweus, an international authority on teen bullying, found that many youths who follow this path acquire their view of violence and intimidation at home—often in dysfunctional families
where bullying is used as a power-assertive child-rearing technique—and from the aggressive actions
they see on television or through video games. Children who grow up in this environment, Olweus says,
have a need to dominate, to be in control, and have little interest in negotiating.
Without intervention, bullies are likely to carry the ramifications of their actions well into
adulthood. Research shows that they are prone to mental health problems such as conduct disorder,
depression, and anxiety, and to continued aggressive behavior, delinquency and gang involvement.
Olweus found that, by the age of 24, about 60 percent of boys who had bullied others in grades 6 to 9
had been convicted of a criminal offense.

step in what eventually becomes more overt acts of
violence.
Turning to Violence
In 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold,
who were widely reported to have been bullied
in school, went on a shooting rampage at
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo.,
killing 13 including themselves, and injuring 21
others. Seung-Hui Cho was 23 when he opened
fire at Virginia Tech, killing 32 before taking his
own life, but authorities said that much of his
anger could be traced to his high school days,
when fellow students had made fun of his shyness
and accent.
Dr. James Shaw, assistant professor of forensic
psychology at The Chicago School’s Los Angeles
Campus, has spent years studying the causes of
teen violence. His book, Jack and Jill and Why
They Kill: Saving Our Children, Saving Ourselves,
shares the stories of 13 adolescents serving time
in state youth prisons for murder. His insights
were the subject of a keynote address he gave
at the first commemoration of the Columbine
tragedy. While the juvenile inmates he
interviewed did not necessarily point to bullying
as a cause for their rage, all articulated feelings
of alienation, isolation, and being unloved and
unlovable. They expressed disappointment in a
person they trusted and with whom they had a
connection.
“There is no uniform behavior or set of symptoms for children who turn to violence, although
the news media would like to have everyone fit into
a formula,” Dr. Shaw said. “The closest I can come
is to say all were unhealthy children psychologically
and emotionally, and all felt some level of betrayal.”
An important thing to recognize, he emphasized,
is that “these are kids, not fully formed, and not
completely matured psychologically.” He added
that the majority did not understand the gravity of
what they had done until their court appearance,
when they realized the impact their actions had had
on family members and the community.
In an effort to counteract teen violence, Dr.
Shaw has founded the B.R.A.V.E. (Be Resilient
Avoid Violence Everywhere) program, through
which he helps children recognize and resist the
pressure to engage in any form of violence or bullying as a means of problem-solving. The project

has taken off, gaining recognition throughout the
criminal justice system, and has been cited by the
Philadelphia Regional Office of the FBI as “an
example of best community practices.”
Dr. Shaw contends that while parents have
responsibility for bringing up children who can
readily distinguish right from wrong, schools need
to do a better job of addressing aggressive activities.
“We need a violence-prevention curriculum
that is taught side by side with social studies and
English,” he says. “If we can mandate driver’s
education, why can’t we require this too? Social
driving—social navigation—is as important as
anything else we teach in school.”

The 21st
century bully:
online, not in
your face
While physical bullying has steadily decreased since
2003, it is a trend that has been eclipsed by a relentless
increase in cyberbullying. In a survey completed last
year by the National Crime Prevention Council, more than
43 percent of teens reported having been a victim of
cyberbullying—through email, texting, and websites such
as Facebook and YouTube.
This trend has reversed the profile of the typical bully and
victim. Once the stereotypical domain of boys—both as aggressors and targets—bullies are now more likely to be female,
as are those on the receiving end of their torment. According
to research by Dr. Robin Kowalski at Clemson University, 13
percent of girls reported that they had used electronic media to
harass others, while 9 percent of boys did. Similarly, one in four
girls reported having been cyberbullied, while only one in 10
boys reported having been targeted.
Dr. Kowalski’s research pointed to instant messaging as
the weapon of choice for many cyberbullies, with more than
two-thirds of students reporting harassment that took this
form. Students also reported cyberbullying that took place
through chat rooms (25 percent), email (24 percent), web
postings (24 percent) and text messaging (15 percent).
Cyberbullying can be more toxic than traditional bullying,
the Cyberbullying Research Center reports, because of
its potential for anonymity, its ability to go viral within
minutes—reaching thousands of others—and its ease of
access, using technology that most adolescents have at
their fingertips.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 23

the country and claims to have reduced bullying
by up to 70 percent in some schools. Its focus is
on improving school climate, training teachers
and staff to recognize and deal with bullying
incidents, and involving parents in conversations
about how best to support their children.
Dr. Dan Koonce, associate professor of school
psychology at The Chicago School’s Chicago
Campus, is a strong believer in using Positive
Behavior Intervention and Supports (PBIS), a
systems approach to creating a positive social
climate in schools, as a weapon against bullying.
Rather than focusing solely on discipline, PBIS
incorporates proactive strategies for defining,
teaching, and supporting appropriate student
behaviors.
It is a two-part approach, he says, involving
both a teacher-training component and direct
instruction of all students in how to identify
bullying and how to respond—as a victim or as a
bystander.
“Some teachers are not fully aware of what’s
happening—especially when relational aggression is taking place,” Dr. Koonce says. “Texting
can be just as dangerous as more outward forms
of bullying, and teachers have to know how to
identify and address it.”
Unfortunately, addressing the issue on a
schoolwide or even communitywide level is often
not enough. All 50 states have enacted some form
of anti-bullying legislation—many specifically
targeting cyberstalking, cyberharassment, and
cyberbullying. In March 2011, President and
Mrs. Obama hosted a White House Conference
on Bullying Prevention, which included leaders
from the American Psychological Association,
educators, politicians, and mental health professionals. Participants discussed ways to empower
students to come to the aid of classmates who
are being victimized, and how to involve family
members in teaching their children more respectful ways of interacting with their peers.
Too often, bullying incidents become a matter
for the legal system, typically when they lead to
violence. Both adults and juveniles have faced
charges when their harassment activities resulted
in attempted suicide or other injuries, and victims
have been known to lash out, taking revenge on
those who have tormented them. Sometimes, too,
verbal taunting or cyberbullying is just the first

2
1

WE HAVE A
HOSTAGE SITUATION
3

I

t’s a scene guaranteed to set hearts racing, hands
trembling, and blood pressure soaring—a worstnightmare-come-true setting that has already lasted
several hours too many. In one small room, a handful
of terrorized individuals, held at gunpoint by an
abductor making impossible demands in exchange
for their release. In other areas, negotiators, who communicate
with the offender via a crackling “throw phone,” and a command center staffed by FBI agents and a SWAT team specially
trained to deal with high-risk crisis incidents.

It’s real-world learning at its best: a two-credit class called
Hostage Negotiations, offered as a capstone to students in
The Chicago School’s Forensic Psychology program. The
course teaches skills and communication techniques needed
to de-escalate critical situations, as well as an understanding
perpetrators’ psychological profiles and the ability to manage
stress. Dr. Nancy Zarse (Psy.D. ’89), associate professor, developed the program based on training she received through the
Bureau of Prisons. It is the only known program of its kind
offered by an educational institution.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 25

4

6

7

5

Forensic Psychology students
role play as hostages while the
offender holds them at gunpoint. With
survival strategies as part of their curriculum, they must demonstrate that they
can manage stress and resist antagonizing
their abductor. In a second session later in
the day, they will have the opportunity to
play members of the negotiation team.

1

Student Martinette Zeeman negotiates
with the hostage taker. Her goals
are to use active listening skills to
calm the perpetrator, while also gathering
information and assessing his psychological state. What she learns will determine
the team’s approach.

2

Lisa Britton, Travis Ickes, and Nydia
Gonzalez work as a team to organize
information they have gathered and
develop strategies for negotiating the safe
release of the hostages.

3

Kristin Collins fills the role as
primary negotiator while Roman
Grubbs coaches her. The use of a
“throw phone” (thrown in to the hostage
taker as a means of communication) allows
the coach to hear the conversation and make
suggestions to facilitate the negotiations.

4

The tactical team leader, an FBI agent
on the SWAT team, reviews the
intelligence gathered to date, and
seeks additional information necessary to
form command decisions. The involvement
of law enforcement professionals adds a
realistic flavor to the role play.

5

Students successfully negotiate the
surrender of the hostage taker, who
is arrested upon release. Andrew
Austin (M.A. ‘10), in handcuffs, is a graduate
of the hostage negotiation course and the
Forensic Psychology master’s program.
Currently in the U.S. Army’s Officer
Candidate School, Andrew returned as a
volunteer for the role play.

6

The debriefing session and afteraction review is a critical component
in the day’s role play. What went right?
What went wrong? Now in its fifth year, the
training model has evolved over the years.
“I learned after one of these role plays that
students needed to talk about what they
were feeling,” Dr. Zarse says. “I have now
incorporated a longer after-action session
that allows time for that.”

o his parish in the Hispanic Chicago
neighborhood of West Humboldt Park, he
is known as Father Tom. But to patients
at Saints Mary and Elizabeth Medical
Center, where he works with cancer and AIDS
patients as coordinator of the Supportive Care
Program, he goes by Doctor Tom.
The different monikers underscore the
dual roles that the Rev. Dr. Thomas N.
Pelton balances as a priest and psychologist. Named the 2011 Distinguished
Alumnus of the Year at The Chicago
School’s Commencement Ceremony
on June 10 for embodying the values of
engagement, diversity, and social justice,
he reflected that his two divergent professional paths have helped his practice as a
“wounded healer.”
“In both professions we practice
the healing arts and disciplines, albeit
wounded ourselves,” he said. “Mysteriously and powerfully, many of us discover
that the healing of others takes place in

parallel with our own healing, that our
wounds can become a blessing as they
inspire our wisdom and compassion for the
wounds in others.”
Dr. Pelton’s own path to religion began
while growing up in a strong faith-filled
family on the Southwest Side of Chicago.
He was ordained by the Archdiocese
of Chicago in 1966 and has served in
10 parishes around the city, from East
Englewood on the South Side to East
Rogers Park on the far North Side to his
current position at Maternity BVM Parish
on the West Side, where he has been for
15 years.
But a desire to increase his options
and become more independent—along
with conversations with fellow priests
and Chicago School alumni Rev. Drs.
John Keenan (Psy.D. ’83) and John Lynch
(Psy.D. ’82), and the first dean Allan
Rosenwald—led him to pursue a Psy.D. in
clinical psychology and join the school’s

founding class in 1979. “I had a drive
for more self-understanding and more
understanding of what was going on in the
world around me,” he said.
After graduating in 1991, he worked at
Loretto Hospital’s Addiction Center and
completed his post-doctoral internship
at St. Elizabeth Hospital. For the past
17 years he has worked at Saints Mary
and Elizabeth Medical Center, where he
focuses on palliative care.
“It’s not just end-of-life care though,”
he said. “We’re dealing with patients from
the onset of diagnosis. That fits well with
ministry. Some patients are desirous of a
religious component and others are not.
In the parish, I’m able to do referrals for
psychological services, so my work has
broadened both professions.”
With his parish confronting issues like
immigration, gang violence, and affordable
housing, Dr. Pelton draws on his deep
social justice roots to work with nonprofit
organizations to help meet the needs of the
community—he cofounded the precursor
to the Interfaith Leadership Group of
Cicero, Berwyn, and Stickney; walked in
the Equal Rights March; protested the
segregation of the Lewis Towers swimming
pool in the 1960s; and has participated in
several other demonstrations and rallies
through the years.
But Dr. Pelton doesn’t always find it easy
to navigate between his two worlds, with
patients, colleagues, and parishioners. “If I
go into a room (at the hospital) with a drug
patient who has HIV, he’ll turn away from
me. But if I tell him I’m a priest, it can open
him up. It works the other way too. Both
have powerful projections.
“Historically, there was a great antipathy
between the two professions,” he adds.
“Psychologists thought religion and spirituality were delusional and pathological.
And it can be, but in more contemporary
times, there are groups in both professions
that see an affinity between the two.

INSIGHT MAGAZINE SUMMER 2011 27

However, there are still people in the
field who don’t have trust in the other.”
He also encounters many people
who believe the two professions fit well

together and ultimately values the axiom
that “grace builds on nature.”
“To live a fuller psychological life,
one needs to deal with the eternal

questions and universal energies and
relationships,” he said. “To live a fuller
spiritual life, one needs to deal with one’s
psychological demons and potentialities.”

Ralph Barrera (M.A. ’10)

Vice Cop Turned Youth Advocate

R

alph
Barrera was
a sergeant
in the Los
Angeles Police
Department when
a bullet changed
his life.
Fired in the
line of duty in
accordance with his training and police
department regulations, the bullet took
the life of an offender—but it also took
a toll on Barrera, who embarked on a
decade-long battle with post-traumatic
stress disorder and eventually confronted the reality that it was time for a
career change.
As a PTSD patient, he says, he began to
think about the role that mental health issues play in law enforcement—issues that
affect not only the offender, but victims
and police professionals as well. It was
this new perspective that led to the next
chapter in his life—leaving his 14-year
LAPD career, returning home to Florida,
earning a master’s degree through The
Chicago School’s online Applied Forensic
Psychology Services program, and becoming a youth advocate and court liaison.
“Having been diagnosed with severe
and persistent mental illness myself,
I have a great deal of insight into what
my clients are going through,” he says.
“When I advocate for a defendant in
Felony Mental Health Court, my goal is to
find a balance between the need to keep

the community safe and the need to find
the appropriate placement of my client
back in the community.”
Barrera’s Chicago School degree
brought together a growing interest in
psychology with his extensive police
experience, which included years as an
undercover officer and assignments to
vice and anti-gang units. In his current
job with Archways Mental Health Inc.,
in Broward County, Fla., he advocates
for youth who have committed felonies,
makes sure his clients “don’t fall
between the cracks” of the legal and
mental health systems, and works
with Archways’ eight case managers to
recommend and follow placements for
the youth assigned to him.
“I monitor the case of every defendant, tracking his progress through the

system, and alerting the judge when I
see a placement isn’t working out as
planned,” he says. “I’m not there to
take sides, or to work for a conviction
or to have the case thrown out of court.
Whether my client is a 23-year-old
billionaire arrested for possession or an
indigent alcoholic who thinks he lives in
the Eiffel Tower, I’m just there to make
sure that everything that’s supposed to
happen happens.”
He credits The Chicago School’s online
degree program with giving him the
confidence to reinvent his career in a way
that took advantage of his experience
and interests, and provided him with the
skills to combine the two.
“In some ways, it’s not so different from
what I did as a police officer,” he says. “It’s
a softer approach to helping people.”

Important Information about Your Chicago
School Email Account
Your Chicago School email account is maintained for life. This summer, all
alumni accounts that were created prior to fall 2008 will be moved to the
Google Mail platform, which will offer you more space and better ease of use.

How This Affects You
• Your email address will change from name@thechicagoschool.edu to
name@ego.thechicagoschool.edu.
• You will need a new password to gain access to your account.
• Stay tuned for further instructions and your new password this summer.
Questions? Contact alumni@thechicagoschool.edu.

“You’re coloring the balloon red.” Description.
“You’re doing a great job following the rules.” Praise.
“I’m having SO much fun with you.” Enthusiasm.
While all are common phrases in the world
of parenting, they are less so for mothers whose
histories of poverty, neglect and abuse have
landed them in the charge of the Department of
Child and Family Services and resulted in their
children’s placement in foster care. Typically,
DCFS requires that families remanded to its
supervision complete parenting training before
being reunited with their children. In Chicago,
such parents are often referred to Parent-Child
Interaction Therapy (PCIT), a program run by
The Chicago School Forensic Center.
The program’s goal, says project coordinator
Stephanie Agost (M.A. ’08), is to alter the
negative patterns of interaction between parents
and children while enhancing the parent-child
relationship and decreasing parenting stress and
child behavior problems. Working under the
supervision of faculty and staff, students coach
parents or caregivers through the process of learning positive communication strategies with their
children. They use the acronym PRIDE (praise,
reflection, imitation, description, enthusiasm) to
teach mothers—and the occasional participating
dad—to break the cycle of negative reinforcement
and abusive practices that has been passed down,
sometimes for generations. Student coaches
observe client interactions through a one-way
window and communicate with the parents
through a bug-in-the-ear technology system.
“PCIT combines behavior therapy principles

with traditional child play therapy skills and
translates these aspects of intervention into a
mode of working with families to bring about
healthy, nurturing relationships,” says Dr. Laura
Benton (Psy.D. ’98). A Chicago School alumna
who returned as a faculty member in the forensic
psychology department, Dr. Benton is one of
three who train and supervise students in PCIT.
Together, they help parents master the skills that
can take a potentially volatile exchange between an
ill-tempered child and an exasperated mom or dad
and turn it into a carefully orchestrated give-andtake that helps the parent remain calm while
teaching the child about limits and consequences.
“The strongest advantage that this program has
over other parenting programs is that the therapy
is conducted with the parent and child in the
room together,” Dr. Benton says. “It’s much more
powerful when they can witness the changes actually

taking place in their relationship with their child.”
National data gathered by the U.S. Administration for Children and Families offers evidence
of PCIT effectiveness. According to the ACF
website, physically abusive parents who participate in PCIT are far less likely to have re-reports
of child abuse (19 percent as compared with 49
percent who had not been referred to PCIT).
The Chicago School’s program typically
serves between eight and 12 families a year,
each through individual appointments. Parents
and children show up for weekly sessions,
which are held in a cozy, toy-filled room in the
Forensic Center. For the kids, it’s a time to have
mom’s undivided attention while coloring or
reading stories. But it’s also time to learn the
rules. Tantrums don’t elicit attention, but good
behavior brings praise and hugs. When a parent’s
patience starts to run thin, the reassuring voice
of a student coach—coming steadily through
the unobtrusive earpiece she wears—reminds her
not to raise her voice, to turn negative statements
into positive, and to tell her children how much
she enjoys spending time with them. As kids
respond positively, so does mom, demonstrating
confidence in her own parenting abilities.
Both Agost and Dr. Benton were trained
in PCIT—Agost as a student and Dr. Benton
as a new member of the Forensic Psychology
faculty—by Dr. Tiffany Masson, who introduced the program to The Chicago School when
she joined the faculty in 2006. When launched, it
was the only program of its kind in the area, but
as empirical evidence became available to validate
the program’s efficacy, the use of PCIT has
expanded rapidly. It is now taught and practiced
at universities and family counseling centers
throughout the country, as well as in several
countries in Europe and Asia.

PRIDE in Parenting
Families master PRIDE skills to communicate more effectively with their children.

Praise for good behavior

“Great job playing gentle!”

Reflect appropriate talk and noises

“Yes, that is the red crayon.”

Imitate appropriate play

“I’m going to cook with you.”

Describe appropriate behavior

“You are building a tower.”

Enthusiasm

“I LOVE playing with you!”

last page

Principal Ross greets children and
parents as GPPA opened its doors.

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Experiential Tr aining
Around the World

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Affirming The Chicago Schoolâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s commitment to preparing our
students for work in an increasingly diverse world by providing
international service learning and field work opportunities, nearly
170 students studied abroad in the 2010-2011 academic yearâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;
the most in our historyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;through faculty-led academic courses
in countries that spanned the globe. Their experiences included
providing assessment services and recommending interventions to
orphans in Peru (photos 1 & 2), training childcare workers in Rwanda
and Zambia to counsel young victims of trauma (photos 3 & 4), and
presenting neuroscience research at an international conference in
Prague (photo 5). Students also studied in Israel and the West Bank,
Vienna, London, St. Croix, Brazil, and Mexico.